To form a collaboration among biologists, biomedical scientists, and specialists in adolescent development and science education at Stanford University; film producers, software programmers, and other multimedia specialists at Lucasfilm Learning; and middle school teachers to create two interactive multimedia life science education resources for the classroom: The Nervous System and the Effects of Drugs and Alcohol, and Adolescent Development and Reproductive Biology, including sexual health and illness. The multimedia resources will be based on the Middle Grades Life Science Curriculum being developed by faculty in Stanford's undergraduate Program in Human Biology. The middle grades curriculum has a specific focus on adolescent development and addresses the problems of high risk behaviors in this age group by giving students a solid grounding in biological science and its natural outgrowths into health. The interactive multimedia resources will merge computer software with text, sound, film, video, and still images. These resources will allow both students and teachers to create new pathways through the curriculum in a multidimensional exploration of the material. Students will become more active learners as they discover for themselves the interconnections among the components of a physiological system and work with classmates to create reports using text, sound, and video. Each multimedia resource will be designed and produced by teams of faculty content experts, including middle grades science teachers, at Stanford, working closely with multimedia specialists at Lucasfilm Learning. The prototype resources will be field tested and evaluated by middle school students and teachers. The final products will be published either as stand alone resources with supporting text, or as part of a package with the middle grades life science curriculum.